The Feather Thief Summary
Kirk Wallace Johnson

The Feather Thief Overview

The Feather Thief: Beauty, Obsession, and the Natural History Heist of the Century tells the story of Edwin Rist, a Victorian fly-tying enthusiast who, on a night in 2009, stole hundreds of rare bird skins from the British Museum of Natural History at Tring. Author Kirk Wallace Johnson goes beyond the story of the heist itself to explore humanity's historical interest in collecting and displaying animal specimens for every reason from scientific discovery to fashion. Johnson also chronicles his own attempts to recover some of the priceless artifacts and return them to the museum where they may inform the science of future generations. The Feather Thief explores themes of humanity's responsibility to nature, the war between knowledge and greed, the obsessive need to possess beauty, the pursuit of justice, and the struggle for authenticity.